The new rolling ILX parenting thread, since the other one was getting unwieldy

Hmmm, maybe you should loan them each out, one at a time, on a rotating basis!

I do try. Their grandparents never complain about not seeing enough of the kids :)

It's not so bad really, just that tonight I'm on my own and Megan decided she would take 2 hours instead of her usual 30 minutes to go to sleep.

I'm glad we waited until the two boys were at school before having a third, I think three young 'uns at once would have killed me.

ENBB don't let the birth stories put you off! Good births are possible, mine was ace! Water birth at the 'home from home' birth centre which is midwife led, no pain relief! I'm definitely going for a home birth if there is a next time.

It's the colic and seemingly constant feeding that's brought me back down to earth...

There really is a huge range of birth options out there for you. I actually did have a pain-killer free birth with my second (not really my choice, but Julia was in a huge hurry to arrive). And I might even opt to do it that way again. It's really all kind of amazing.

vicky, two words that will save you: GRIPE WATER

mmm gripe water best of all the waters

I'm with vicky, it's not the labour so much as the adjusting to being at home with a babe that eats 24-7 and prefers to keep you up watching crap middle-of-the-night TV instead of lovely afternoon morse repeats that knocks you for six. but if my births had been more difficult I might feel differently - nothing but a tens machine and gas-n-air both times (against my will, I should add, I was always all about getting the big drugs fast but was too far along when I wanted them).

people fear being induced because it's supposed to be more painful but lemme tell you when it finally kicks in it happens really fast and I reckon it may be worth the trade-off. I was in hard drugs-demanding-but-not-getting labour with ava for only about 90 minutes. and only about 10 minutes with lulu (though I was in the hozzie for days before that trying to get the induction drugs to take and battling high BP and having her wee heartbeat monitored because she wasn't growing, which was a real worry). I suppose you never know what you're going to get dealt but if we didn't forget about the pain eventually nobody would ever have more than one kid. I do remember telling mike during lulu labour that if I could go through this he could bloody well deal with a 2-second procedure to get the snip, so there was definitely some pain going on. I've just forgotten it!

lulu never had full-on colic but she stayed congested for weeks and it made it hard for her to sleep. infacol and gripe water didn't seem to help much at night. we eventually started bunching a pillow under her top half so she slept on an incline and that helped a huge amount.

im not even pregnant with a second one and im thinking about a third. im too old though, i think. too risky.

The risk is apparently somewhat exaggerated. My therapist said they overemphasized the risk. Of course you have to be careful, but you have to be at any age anyway.

Oh good God. I've been battling a pretty intense case of baby fever for the last six months or so until I just read the birth stories towards the end of that thread.

I'm less scared now, but still worried because, well, you never know and secondly I'm a total hypochondriac. That said, I know what's in store (if I have a natural delivery). Don't be scared though, even if you're induced, like I was, and bleed like crazy, which I did, it's one of the greatest experiences ever. There's nothing that compares to it. Giving life is such an amazing and surreal experience. Also, it made me laugh with the saying that men are the strong ones. Don't. Let. Me. Laugh. Women are the ones who are strong. :-)

I guess talent runs in the family

I'm pretty sure that's one of Ligeti's Etudes. Great stuff.

I can't believe Pam, when supposedly working, is posting on here giving me the hard-sell on dogs! We have a dog-on-wheels and a pair of Yoshitomo Nara puppy bookends, what more could we need?

HI DERE!!

http://imagecache2.allposters.com/images/pic/AGF/2794~Beagle-Pup-Posters.jpg

GET THE PUPPY!

A question for everyone: What are your kid's favortite tv shows/dvds/videos etc.

Beeps isnt old enough to have a favorite yet, i guess, so shes forced to watch my favorite:

http://img442.imageshack.us/img442/4316/144082934b633f79603rr8.jpg

my husband objects to wonderpets because one (all?) of them talk with a lisp. I object to Dora because of the SHOUTING! We both like Backyardigans. The kid only likes Maisy. I try not to do too much TV but I try not to worry too much about it either. Today the kid is sick and I am nominating Moose A. Moose for a Nobel Peace prize.

"this is sewious!"

im not sure thats a lisp but its something that probably requires a speech therapist

i haven't heard of moose a moose

I object to Dora because of the SHOUTING!

Dora taught my two boys how to speak Spanish (or at least how to shout up to five!).

Come on, vamanos, Everybody, let's go! Come on, let's get to it! I know that we can do it!

These days it's all 'Ben10', 'Johnny Test' and 'Ed, Edd & Eddy' on Cartoon Network.

Megan doesn't even look at the TV, I think she sees it as something the boys look at when they're ignoring her and therefore is Bad.

I think I've noticed Dora on telly. My husband didn't much like it. But not because she shouts so much. I don't mind at all if my kid shouts, in fact I like it if she raises her voice (though of course not all the time). I even like it that she has (small) tantrums. It's good to let go once in a while. She doesn't have the ability to say:"I'm grumpy, leave me alone." so a tantrum does the trick now. ;-)

I'm also in favour of her watching telly. Not too much, but I definitely like her watching, say, Nijntje (Miffy), Bumba, Wawa, Teletubbies,... It's educational. She loves to point at objects and name them. She used to watch Teletubbies but now less so as she has moved on to Nijntje (Miffy) which she ADORES. She also quite likes the Disney programs but they are on BBC so she can't really understand it anyway. (Hey, maybe she'll learn English like me, by watching loads of BBC programs/films?)

Shows she loves/watches: Hopla, Bumba, Nijntje (Miffy, nijntje.nl is a grebt website I think),...

Scary experience: She climbs the stairs... on her own. We were literally one minute talking to eachother and not noticing what she was doing. We got up and looked in the hallway. She was almost at the top of the stairs. EK! The next day she wanted to step down the stairs. We don't prohibit it at all, in fact we want her to learn as quickly as possible. It's funny. The other day we said:"Shall we go to bed?" She ran off to the stairs, climbed up the staircase and went into the bathroom pointing at the bath. She used to be scared of a bath, now she LOVES it.

The latest in the "they're not babies forever, you know" series:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v292/aldo_cowpat/DSC00962.jpg

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Earlier this week, giving me the ol' "whaddya mean there's no more ice cream?" look.

http://vassifer.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/08/28/img_6201_3.jpg

That'll be the cover of their indie-rock album in twenty years.

aldo's kids should be models already

hey, I recognise that "whaddya mean there's no more ice cream" look. mostly when I look in the mirror, ho! I really love how kids always manage to smear 90% of the contents of any bowl on their faces and the table in front of them. if you were a neat freak, I bet having kids could really push you over the edge.

I saw an episode of 'little angels' once (do the amuricans get this on bbc amurica yet I wonder?). two or three families go into a big retreat of a playhouse because they have food/sleeping/tantrum issues with their toddlers and dr tanya byron (who I have a lot of time for, I reckon she could take supernanny on in a duke-em-out) observes the whole family's behaviour for a week and fixes them all up with her big game plan of calming behaviour.

the mum of one especially cute youngster had been wiping his face so often between bites of food over the years that he'd developed an intense fear of any food that wasn't rock hard lest he make a mess. dr tanya asked him to eat some yogurt with his fingers and the poor little guy was just shaking with fear whenever his fingers got near the pot. mum didn't mean to scare the bejesus out of him, she was just tidying up! it was all ok in the end, natch.

ava's big into sesame street at the moment, I've ordered a bunch of the DVDs of the old shows from the states, episodes that I grew up on. I don't remember it being aware of it when I was little, but cookie monster has appalling grammar, the count is great with numbers but not so hot at stringing a full sentence together and bert + ernie inhale sodapop by the gallon. it's kind of refreshing and makes me feel better about hating those goody-goody tweenies so much. ava's other fave show is 'in the night garden' which is also pretty good. she's watching 'bobinogs' right now, it's edumacational and fun. 'peppa pig' is another fave, it comes in short bursts of funny which is the best kind of children's tv IMHO.

we listen to music more than we watch television lately because I've noticed that ava gets a bit wiggy and crash-tackles lulu a lot more when she's been in front of the tv for too long. I hope I'm not a bad mum for restricting her viewing to cbeebies shows or DVDs that don't do my head in. give me 'the herbs' to newfangled computerised noddy any day.

It's ALWAYS good parenting to restrict TV access.

We don't have a TV so at least I don't worry about Alice seeing adverts, but she did spend her formative months absorbing old episodes of Buffy, Angel, Scrubs and The Office while I fed her in front of the laptop so god knows what damage that's done...

She is currently enjoying a Teletubbies DVD from the library, although gets fed up when they cut away from Tinkywinky et al and onto the Welsh kids feeding lambs. Real people = too much like boring old mum and dad I guess.

archel, ava doesn't like the real people bits of teletubbies either, and thanks to 'again! again!' you're always treated to them twice.

the adverts are insidiuos. we mostly watch cbeebies which doesn't have adverts because it's BBCtastic, but we don't have a freeview box upstairs where we watch peppa pig of a morning when I'm willing myself to get up and face the day. have you noticed how many crazy toys there are at the moment that involve dolls with their own plastic pets that poop and pee when you squeeze them?

look out vicky, when aidan gets old enough to watch these he's going to squeeze the hell out of toffee and rhubarb.

So long as he can squeeze toffee when he's over the litter tray, it'd be an improvement.....

Is it sad that I'd already started collecting DVDs of 'classic' children's programmes? we've got the flumps and Mr Men, hurrah! Aidan was awake for his very first Liverpool match yesterday, Daddy was very pleased.

Haven't posted any fluff for a while....

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrsbrown/1152140533/"; title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1347/1152140533_6be045e5f8.jpg"; width="500" height="375" alt="" /></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrsbrown/1203741548/"; title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1090/1203741548_fafb9db8a3.jpg"; width="500" height="375" alt="What you looking at?" /></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrsbrown/1202889743/"; title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1285/1202889743_8d2297e368.jpg"; width="375" height="500" alt="milk drunk" /></a>

Lets try that again shall we?

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1347/1152140533_6be045e5f8.jpg?v=0

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1090/1203741548_fafb9db8a3.jpg?v=0

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> 'little angels'

'house of tiny tearaways'

Aw gorgeous pics Vic. He looks so much littler in real life!

Those Baby Einstein DVDs are like drugs for toddlers. I think they are well made and look pretty interesting. For adults who have to be in the room at they same time, the are quite restful compared to most of what else is out there. Just plinky-plonky versions of the Blue Danube etc while octopuses swim around. They call them "digital board books" which seems like an annoying marketing tag but it kinda makes sense as you can sit there and talk about what's going on, just like with a book.

that third picture of aidan is the best thing ever. those cheeks!

oh, yeah, sorry koogs you're right! 'little angels' is the supernanny-style show she had before where she camped out with one family and sorted them out, my bad.

actually, I'm watching 'supernanny' as I type and she has done a cracking job with a family of two soft touches and the angriest child on earth. the WWF-style duke-em-out might have to be called a draw.

Ok, this is pure selfishness but I'm bumping this; I'm only a lurker but your tales and pictures of the little'uns makes each working day a little sunnier...

I have just realised that I will have to knock up the missus pronto so I can watch 'Yo! Gabba Gabba' - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggrOcBWqHiU - with my firstborn.

I fear we are overexposing our Ophelia a bit too much to TV. She loves Nijntje - climbs up the stairs at full speed so she can watch the show every evening. I don't mind that much, I used to watch hours of telly when I was younger and actually learned English that way (from about the age of 8 or 9). So I can sort of understand the educational part of certain programs.

We are going to check out two schools because next year we'll be sending her off (hahah that expression) to kindergarten. We have two good schools in the vicinity, both a ten minute walk from our house/shop. They are both Catholic schools, but one's with a uniform (from elementary school) which I quite like. It's not a very strict uniform, the clothes merely have to be blue, but that more or less clinches it for me. We're still going to check out the otehr school as welll. You never know.

Last trimester of my pregnancy. I have gained much too much weight. Even the OBGYN commented on it, but he wasn't too *angry* about it. Just said I shouldn't be eating for two. :-( I'm also suffering from reflux again, but no pelvic pain yet. The baby's still in breech (?) but I'm not too worried about it as the baby's head can face down at the last moment. If not, then it's a caesarian. Not looking forward to it, duh, but if it needs to be a caesarian so be it.

V, those pix are sooooo endearing!

Also convince me that a second one will be as easy as the first one. :-) I am hoping that it will be an easy ride, but I fear it'll also involve a lot of adaptation. I remember freaking out the first weeks, being confronted with so much change, but that more or less disappeared after three weeks. (That 3 week period seems to be key: after that period, breastfeeding was just a breeze but I also felt more confident about taking care of Ophelia as well the pelvic pain that disappeared...)

Yeah, second one totally easy, no problems, just relax...(laughs behind hand).

Srsly tho, you have seen most of the problems and things the first time round so it's let's freaky when, for instance, they get a temperature or something I think. Also, you've got a load of clothes possibly? Plus those things like pushchairs, babyseats, etc.

My 2 have taken to acting in front of the camera, this is their version of stuck in the jungle under a giant leaf, child 2 has really got it down...
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1315/1309598079_2007547f57_m.jpg

How cute!!! :-)

Oh yeah, financially it'll be a lot less demanding as we're having another girl. We're only buying two cribs (one tiny one for in our bedroom and another for the kid's room). Apart from that there's nothing much we need to buy, really. We bought another diaper cushion.

It's the sleep deprivation that I'm not looking forward to. hah. But that is more or less over in four months time,... I hope anyway. :-)

I had forgotten about that! Yes, that is the worst. He had 4 years of it because child 1 started sleeping badly when child 2 arrived. In fact Mrs T was talking about having another child the other day and I need to remember to remind her about the sleep deprivation, that should distract her for a while...

As much to cheer myself up as hejira and any other lurkers...

Ava dreams of a sewing future...

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1037/1270069485_9973efd177.jpg

Lulu shows off her two - count 'em - teeth...

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1134/1270103733_98f48e3e78.jpg

How old is Lulu now?

I also dream of sewing. Alas, it's more nightmares... :-(

Lulu - 10 months yesterday.

How's Ava's sleeping pattern now? Better?

Oh, she still comes in with us almost every night but since dispensing with her afternoon nap she goes down much better at 8pm or so (so she at least get 4-6 hours in her own bed before diving in with us). We're seeing a slow improvement in her general behaviour too - I think if we can keep the domestic chaos to a minimum and engage with her as much as possible, it really helps curtail her sister-assaulting/130dB-screaming tendencies. Lulu is still in the constant-joy phase (though she can now climb stairs...) but she too will have us at our wits end before long.

(If Koogs is reading this - T4ms1n just had her third! A boy named Laurie.)

Good lord. It frightens me a bit (to have a second) as I know I'm blessed with Ophelia's sleeping pattern. She slept through the night from the age of 4 months and now, if we keep her up until 7:30 pm, she climbs the stairs by herself, without a cry or whatever, when we ask her "Let's go to sleep!" She even points at the net, waves at us and says bye bye when we aren't quick enough. She rarely if ever wakes up in the middle of the night.

So maybe Lulu will be like Ophelia, Michael, you never know! :-)

Thanks Michael, much appreciated. Lulu is pure innocent cuteness (going by her pictures...) but Ava looks like a future heartbreaker. Those eyes! I've really enjoyed watching them grow up in pictures on this thread - as well as all the others.

Charlotte and Oliver this past weekend...

http://homepage.mac.com/alexinnyc/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2007-09-02%2015.37.57%20-0700/Image-D15E196559A011DC.jpg

Drunken baby Rockettes!
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1205/1305472338_303645184e.jpg

Me and Ben
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1032/1236228740_2d69c31f4b.jpg

Piano lessons from dad
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1229/1232853846_7341d54d85.jpg

Alex, I'm really looking forward to the days when Ava and Lulu are having a good old blanket guffaw together like Charlotte and Oliver, that's just awesome.

Nathalie, don't fear the arrival of number two, you've got no choice but to adapt and hopefully Ophelia will lead her by example into the world of sleep appreciation, it sounds like she could teach Ava a thing or two. The second time around so many things are just second nature and for me at least, I've been much more chilled out about everything. Dropped piece of bread? 5-second rule. A bit of a tumble? Big cuddle instead of a 3-hour wait at A&E to discover her wee noggin's a-ok like you instinctively knew it was. Borrow the car keys? Ok but be back by midnight, Lulu. And you can wipe that lipstick off right now, missy.

During the first few weeks I found it really hard to look after Ava and also meet the chow-down demands of Lulu so I didn't end up breastfeeding nearly as long as I'd wanted, but you go with the flow, as it were. The second time has just gone so dang quick, that's what kills me. Yesterday we upgraded Lulu into a front-facing carseat, she was just busting out of the smaller one. They're growing up so fast, sniff. You want it to last but at the same time it's also gotta be really fun when they're old enough to be giving it some fake fear for the camera, trapped in the jungle under a leaf.

A question for everyone: What are your kid's favortite tv shows/dvds/videos etc.
OMG Molly is obsessed with "Teletubbies" and will totally make out with her Po doll. She does the same with Tinky Winky. I don't know what any of this means. Like, at all.

Also, the theme from "The Muppet Show" makes her dance like crazy but she doesn't really watch the rest of it, or any other show really including "Sesame Street."